Landscaping must adapt as climate changes, warns lecturer

Planning gardens to meet the challenges of the changing climate will be a critical aspect of landscapers' work during the coming months and years.

Landscapers will be at the forefront of creating environments that will
thrive in the changing conditions, said Writtle College senior lecturer
in landscape management Mick Lavelle.

He said: "Climate change is happening but we are all too obsessed with
working out who is to blame and meeting targets.

"The simple fact is that the climate is already changing and as a
landscaper you may think it is fine to bung something in the ground and
hand over, but if the plants don't grow that is your problem."

The higher temperatures predicted by climate-change scientists will have
an impact on the types of plants seen in the British garden. Lavelle
said: "Some of the stalwarts of British horticulture and the landscape
may need to be replaced.

"We need to think about what the gardens of the future will be like. The
science is the important part of this.

"There is a danger we will run out of plants purely through our own
inactivity and failure to face up to what is happening."

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